LSAT 131 | Section 3 | Logical Reasoning: Q3

LR Question 3 Explanation

QUESTION TEXT: Hemoglobin, a substance in human blood, transports oxygen

QUESTION TYPE: Most Strongly Supported

FACTS: Hemoglobin picks up oxygen.

It can collect up to four molecules.

Each time it picks up a molecule, hemoglobin changes shape and can pick up molecules more easily.

ANALYSIS: You might think the right answer here repeats the info from the stimulus. Not so. It’s very close, but not the same.

On a MSS/MBT question, if you think the answer is repeating the stimulus, that’s almost certainly the right answer.

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1. We don’t know this. We know hemoglobin with three oxygen molecules has better odds of getting a fourth. But maybe it’s really hard to get oxygen! “More likely” doesn’t mean “highly likely”.
2. This is silly. The shape is an important factor, but the stimulus didn’t rule out all other factors.
3. CORRECT. This makes sense. The stimulus said that the more oxygen molecules hemoglobin has, the easier it picks up further oxygen molecules.
    
   You might think the stimulus already said this. But it didn’t directly say “three is easier than one”. Instead, that’s something we can infer from the general statement that more molecules = easier to pick up an additional one.
4. This contradicts the stimulus. The author said that hemoglobin changes shape as it picks up oxygen.
5. We don’t know this. It’s possible there’s not enough oxygen for every hemoglobin molecule to pick some up.